Flights of Misery

I'm so incredibly glad that this past weekend was (hopefully) my last time having to travel to Florida for school. In fact, it's the last time I have to fly anywhere for a while, and I'm incredibly thankful for that, as well. Because the Ft. Lauderdale airport? It's enough to put you off flying completely (as in for the rest of your days.) Normally, my trips in and out of the airport have been relatively easy - it's not a huge airport, after all, and they seem to have a reasonable handle on things. But yesterday, for whatever reason, they seemed determined to cause as many mental breakdowns as possible.

First off, Jet Blue (who normally I love) has a bizarre schedule. Most weekends there is a 2:00 flight from Ft. Lauderdale back to DC on Sundays. This is a great flight because it gets me home at a reasonable hour and I don't have to miss any class on Sunday morning in order to get to the airport on time. This weekend, for whatever ridiculous reason, there was no 2:00 flight. There was an 11:00 flight (classes run til noon) and there was a 4:55 flight. That was it. So, with an inward groan, I booked myself on the 4:55 flight and tried to embrace the idea of 4 hours to read in the airport.

Well, yesterday after class, I toddled to my car and filled it back up (all 3 gallons that I used) and made my way back to the airport. (On the way there I did get to see miles and miles of motorcycles on their apparently annual Toys for Tots ride. It was pretty neat. I tried to take a photo with my phone, but snapping pictures while driving is more difficult than you might imagine if you're also trying to avoid having a wreck.) I turned in my car, checked in, got my boarding pass and headed through security at the B terminal since the flight was to go out of B8. It was about 1:15 at this point.

I should stop and explain a little about the Ft. Lauderdale airport - or at least the part of it that Jet Blue flies in and out of - it's essentially a hub and spoke setup. The airline counters are in the hub (as is the baggage claim, etc.) and the terminals spear off the hub like lollipops. Each terminal has its own security area before you can enter what would be the lollipop stick of the terminal. So once you find out what gate you're leaving from, that dictates what security you go through. And once you're in that terminal, there's no easy way to change terminals - you have to leave the secured area, go back through the hub, and then through the security on the lollipop stick of whatever terminal you want to enter.

So I make my way rather quickly through security, stop and buy a book since I'd finished the one I brought along, and grab a little lunch. Then I plop in a seat after double checking the monitors to see that my flight was still listed on time, and bury myself in the book. At about 2:30, I decide I need to stretch my legs, throw away the lunch trash, etc. So, as I'm wandering down the aisle, I notice that the monitor now says that my flight is leaving out of C6. My initial thought is, "Well, crud." So I find a gate agent and try to confirm that they've not only changed gates, but have changed terminals. She confirms that the flight is supposed to leave out of C6 (I think she probably just looked at the monitor like I did, but whatever) so I lug my stuff out past security, cross the hub of the airport and stand in line for the security for the C terminal.

When I get to the front of the line, the TSA lady tells me that I'm at the wrong terminal. Because my boarding pass says B8. So I explain and she uses her walkie talkie to confirm that my flight is indeed going out of C6 now, scribbles on my boarding pass and I wend my way through the xray machines (take off the shoes, take the laptop out of the bag, take the baggie of makeup out of the bag, throw everything in bins and heft my suitcase onto the long metal tables) and down to the gate where, happily, I see the flight number and Washington-Dulles on the lighted board above the check-in desk. I heave a sigh of relief, settle into a seat and pull out my book again. It's now about 3:00.

At about 3:40, I catch a glint of something out of the corner of my eye and look up from my book. And notice that the lighted sign behind the check-in desk is now blank. At this point I experience a note of panic. So I tuck my book away and wander up to the desk to ask if the flight is still leaving from this gate. And the gate agent shakes his head and says "B6".

"B6?" I ask. "Seriously? You've changed the terminal again?"
He simply shrugs. So I ask, "Could you please see if you can confirm that? I really don't want to go through security again if I don't need to."

This appears to be a reasonable thing to him, so he fiddles on the computer and makes a call and eventually confirms that yes, now the flight is going out of gate B6. Glancing at the time, I realize that it's now 3:55 and they're to begin boarding at 4:25. So I ask if he can call ahead to the gate and let them know that there are people coming.

"You've got an hour, you'll be fine." This is his oh-so-helpful response.

Ok, fine. It's not that big an airport, I probably will be fine. So I ask through the growing frustration if he could please print me a new boarding pass so that I don't have to hassle with security about how mucked up my old one is. He does and I trudge back down the C terminal and across the hub of the airport and back down to the security area for the B terminal.

To say the security line is ginormous is an understatement. The only security line longer that I've ever experienced was at Dulles on the 3rd of July. This line completely fills the main switchback area (probably about 6 rows of 25 - 30 people). It completely fills the secondary switchback area (about 8 rows of 10 - 15 people). And it stretches down the entirety of the raised walkway that connects the hub of the airport to the rental car area. This walkway crosses six lanes of traffic. When I realize how huge this is and note that it's now 4:00, I begin to truly panic, wondering how it's possible to miss a flight when you were at the airport four hours ahead of its departure.

So, taking a deep breath, I ask the TSA lady who's guarding the entrance to the primary area of the security line if there's any way I can skip some of the line because of the departure time etc. She says to go get in line and, when I get to that point again, if it's an issue they'll see what they can do. Since I don't trust myself to speak I shuffle to the end of the line, grab my phone, and proceed to breakdown into Tim's ear. Poor Tim.

So there I stand, pressed against the glass wall of the walkway in a long line of people sobbing into my phone about how I'm going to miss my plane because the airport is stupid and I'm too stupid to just come at the last minute like a normal person and if I hadn't been so early this never would have happened, and so on and so forth. And Tim, who wouldn't know panic if it walked up and introduced itself, tells me it's all going to be fine. Which actually helped a little bit. Sniffling, mascara running down my cheeks, I made it through the rest of the line and to the gate just before the final boarding call. There was even still room for my roll on bag.

Talking with the flight attendant once I was settled, it turns out that they were aware of the problem but unable to do anything because, you see, the gate was never changed. The person in charge of typing the information to display on the monitor? Yeah, they made a typo.